


Numbers

by chibinocho



Category: Saiyuki (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Character Study, Developing Relationship, Domestic, Introspection, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:20:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23576800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chibinocho/pseuds/chibinocho
Summary: Hakkai thinks upon the numbers in his life and the connections between them.
Relationships: Cho Hakkai/Genjo Sanzo, Cho Hakkai/Sha Gojyo, Genjo Sanzo & Son Goku
Kudos: 20





	Numbers

**Author's Note:**

> This is an old one that I have updated and rewritten. I do love a character study

Being a logical man, Hakkai enjoys his numbers. A quantifiable amount presents an achievable concept, an attainable goal and a specified amount of effort. He sees numbers go by daily with each one having its own special significance and yet each number has a cause and effect to the next number in the sequence. Like how many hours sleep Gojyo has had directly corresponds to how many jibes he will make at Goku when travelling (Hakkai has worked out it is 10 jibes per hour). Equally, how many beers Sanzo has had will always correspond to how many bullets will end up in the inn's room wall. There’s something beautiful about that simplistic formula and pattern.

Of course, there are the more ongoing numbers. These are the ones that Hakkai counts almost daily and tries not to think about if he can avoid it. These numbers contain his very life and - like the best equations – will fall apart if even one number is removed.

3, 245. Their current mileage is something that Hakkai regularly mulls over, especially as Houtou castle is coming ever closer. As the driver and navigator rolled into one, he controls this number and it has become something of a game to try and end up with a better-sounding number by the time they stop. He often wonders if the others have caught onto the stopping coincidences of 555, 666, 777, 888, 999 and the like all happening to be where they have stopped or stayed. Hakkai convinces himself that Hakuryu likes the game just as much as he does but he knows better that it reflects his need to stay living and mark his way through life.

23 is his body’s physical age, although he is very nearly twenty-four. Hakkai finds it hard to believe at times that he has packed so much into his life, but the evidence is there in front of him in the morning mirror. Not counting the scar, he can see the marks of a life over-lived: dark circles finding it more and more difficult to go away, the beginnings of laughter lines around his eyes, minor scars from everyday wounds that didn’t have time to heal properly, shaving stubble that is coming sooner and sooner before the end of the day. Gojyo laughs at him when he investigates these in the mirror and jokes about them hunting for grey hairs together. Deep down, Hakkai knows that Gojyo sees just as many marks as him.

206\. The bones in the human body are important and 206 is the number of them, although Gojyo would always maintain it’s 207. Especially where Hakkai is concerned. Regardless of the number, this information isn’t important to Hakkai. Whilst he knows, he does not particularly care, that the human body has 206 bones. He is more interested in the 206 injuries he has healed since the beginning of their journey. From Goku’s leg during the Chin Isou incident, to Gojyo’s right little finger shut in a hotel door to Sanzo’s recent arm injury that still keeps him awake at night, Hakkai has forced those broken bones to knit and repair. 

43\. These are currently many dressings and plasters are in Hakkai’s first aid kit. Not a particularly important number itself but certainly important when you consider that Goku has a predilection for any kind of plaster to go over any kind of wound and Sanzo just has a predilection for any kind of wound, it’s a miracle the dressing stocks are so high right now. Or else it could be that they have simply stopped in more towns with more medical facilities and Sharak's place has a wealth of medical supplies which is beyond useful. Certainly, his ability to treat wounds has become better. He hopes it’s not because he cares less.

28-30-32. Sanzo’s, his and Gojyo’s waist sizes respectively. Not overly important numbers in the grand scheme of things but particularly important when it comes to laundry. Hakkai is usually the washman of the group but in the times he has been sick, drained of chi or tending to the ikkou’s many injuries it has fallen to the others to sort out the laundry and invariably they get it wrong. Denim has been stretched snugly and wrongly over Hakkai’s backside more than once and it has taken him until now to realise that at 50% of these mistakes are deliberate. Gojyo is indeed a shameless letch. Equally, Goku has moved those black leathers over to Sanzo’s pack more than once.

1,000. How could he forget? The thousand lives he took to become what he despised. He sometimes wishes he could name all thousand of his youkai victims but Sanzo maintains that it would be a waste of atonement. This thousand is also a more empty number than the others, as Hakkai knows he did not take a thousand lives. It was more. Exponentially more. He took out half his village. He took out travellers on the way to Hyakugan Maoh’s. He murdered the Dark Crow Clan, down to the very last one. Even now, how many youkai had he slaughtered his way through on this journey? And, whilst he is being pedantic about it, he took Gojyo’s life as well. The man would laugh about it but he knows just as well as Hakkai does, that Gojyo has only come along on this journey for Hakkai. He has quite literally handed his life over to the man and Hakkai often finds the power intoxicating.

3\. When he thinks of this number, he is surprised it isn’t higher. By all rights it should be. After all, nearly dying comes to them on a daily basis. However it is only three times that Hakkai has felt truly close to dying. First – and most importantly – was his rebirth as Cho Hakkai in the first place. The eight days of suffering through each of his ‘predecessor’s’ crimes and experiencing the mental grief of each of his victims had nearly broken him. Stripped and strapped to a wall in the darkest prison room of the temple, he had howled, cried and finally screamed with the guilt, anger and sheer _pain_ , of it all. Sanzo had been the one to take him down and Hakkai had collapsed to the floor, unable to move or eat for three days. Even now, the thought of his renewal makes his stomach turn in on itself and his scar throb. The second was of course Kami-sama: where those red beads had pierced the various vital organs, coming perilously close to various arteries. When blood had spilled out of his mouth like a river and breath had come short, he had never been more grateful for Gojyo’s strong shoulder. Equally – for the third, and most recent time – it had been Gojyo who had saved him from losing himself to the madness but also had pumped his own heart back into beating when he had purposefully used himself as a conduction device to electrocute a rampaging Goku into submission. He really should consider himself very lucky that he – in effect – survived being a lightning conductor … or he should stay very, very close to Gojyo.

7\. This is a more interesting number. 7 is lucky in many cultures but Hakkai isn’t sure if it is in this context. It has been precisely 7 times that Goku has been to see him to ask about the feelings he is harbouring for Sanzo and it has been exactly 7 times that Hakkai has reassured the boy and given him empty advice about waiting and staying close to someone. It breaks his heart to see the younger man struggling with his mixed up feelings for another man who is father, brother, friend and desired lover all in one. Hakkai has even become an expert at recognising the signs in advance and carefully plans the rooming situation accordingly so the mixed up ball of energy can quietly confess without any implications. It is Hakkai and Goku’s secret and he trusts Hakkai not to tell Sanzo. 

7 times that Hakkai has subtly suggested that Sanzo go easy on Goku.

39\. The number of days Hakkai has secretly been using multi-vitamin pills to enhance Gojyo and Sanzo’s diets. After realising that Gojyo’s main source of carbohydrate was beer, he has taken to crushing the pills into their drinks and food, to try and get them onto the more healthy side of life. For Gojyo it has meant longer night sleeps and for Sanzo it has bought gastrointestinal stability – both of which have resulted in less gunshots in the jeep. Hakkai is planning to move onto sedatives next for the longer legs of the journey.

88\. This is 88 centimetres and the measurement is what Hakkai is almost positive is the size of Miss Yaone’s breasts. Don’t give him wrong, he is a gentlemen and certainly wouldn’t dream of even approaching a young woman who very clearly has her sights set on another but he cannot forget the number since Gojyo made the remark “I bet those gotta be at least 100cm!” during a recent trivial battle. Hakkai sometimes feels the urge to tell Gojyo that correct number but he knows that that is opening himself up for trouble.

9\. The number times he has berated himself for having this knowledge.

19\. The number of times he has turned down an offer of sex from strangers. When Hakkai thinks about it in numbered terms, it makes him sound conceited. It’s usually the waitress or bar girls in the towns they stay in. Four young, unattached men are often rarities in these backwater towns and logically, Hakkai knows why he is favoured. Goku is too young and so tends to fall easily into being mothered rather than desired. Sanzo – naturally – is a holy man, although there are quite a few ladies who have seen that as a challenge rather than a deterrent. Gojyo rarely needs to be asked and Hakkai tries not to think about the numbers there, although he is beginning to realise that for Gojyo it’s more the chase than the catching, another chance to make a woman happy with the attention with expecting anything at all. Nothing to do with any kind of childhood trauma at all. Certainly not. So this – naturally – leaves Hakkai and he knows how he appears on the surface: an average-looking, quiet man who is more bookish than flirty. This appears to be attractive to certain ladies.

11\. The numbers of boxer shorts he started the journey with. However, as they have travelled on and elastic has worn; legs have frayed and pairs simply ‘mislaid’, Hakkai has reluctantly come around to the idea of communal underwear. If they manage to get an inn with washing facilities, there are lines of shorts on the line, washed in sub-standard washers to many times that each has fallen into the ever-so-slightly shapeless, slightly shrunk-so-snug and almost-faded variety. Hakkai knows that the sets need replacing, however, when Gojyo gets up half asleep in the morning and slides on the underwear that Hakkai himself wore before they were washed, he realises that new underwear would be an unnecessary expense.

4\. Quite honestly, four is the maximum amount of times Hakkai can ask for something from Sanzo before the gunshots start being threatened. Put simply, Sanzo is a man of extraordinary stubbornness and asking him for something will encourage a quiet rage and a constant hammer-thumb twitch. However, even Sanzo can be gently persuaded to recognise the necessity of certain things and has begun to realise that if Hakkai asks four times then the request is probably genuine. In particular, stopping for recovery time seems to be the most-asked for time. Hakkai knows it’s because Sanzo would never admit weakness and needs to put up a good show.

If Goku and Gojyo learned this number, then gunshots in the jeep would be fewer.

2\. This is the number that Hakkai prefers not to think about; for twice is the number of times he has had sex with Sanzo. It forms an ugly lump in his gut to think about it as he knows that the other two (another 2 …) members of their party would react in a highly emotional – and highly understandable way. Goku would be heartbroken that Sanzo had chosen another and Gojyo … even though their official ‘arrangement’ came later, Gojyo’s is still a reaction Hakkai doesn’t want to – and certainly cannot - think about . In some ways he would like to blame Sanzo: after the trouble with Hazel and Ukoku and seeing Goku coming so close to insanity and death, Sanzo unleashed his bitterness and fears like a tsunami on Hakkai’s body, fuelled by the heady concoction of ridiculous amounts of alcohol and feelings of betrayal. It was Sanzo who had taken the action: pushing them both down into the threadbare little pillow, covered him and with little preparation had taken his body again and again. However, Hakkai had known and still knows now that at any point he could have easily denied him and during both times there had been two distinctly different cries of release… And that it had happened again two days later. He is grateful that Sanzo never mentions this – or even if he remembers - but cannot help but think of it when he hears the word “two”.

19\. The number of nightmares Gojyo has had that has had him sat up in bed, shaking like a leaf, sucking in those great gulps of air that never satisfies those night terrors. Nineteen times he has clung to Hakkai after these nightmares and soaked his shoulder with tears that don’t exist. Nineteen times Hakkai has held him tight against his chest and fought not to be tempted by the rich interplay of muscles beneath surprisingly soft, golden skin that the sweet scent of sleep clings to. He has listened to Gojyo’s deepest fears: the rejection, his mother, his brother and his childhood. It is Hakkai alone in the group who understands the root cause of Gojyo’s self-destructive tendencies, why he fights with a weapon designed to keep everyone away and why he only goes after people who are guaranteed to leave him. It’s easier to prepare for abandonment than hope for things to stay. This is why that - no matter what time of night and no matter what physical conditions he is in – Hakkai will rise from his own bed and go to Gojyo’s to comfort the man. Call it unrequited, call it the actions of a man who has been ‘too late’ in the past, call it friendship, Hakkai just knows it’s something he must do.

5\. The amount of birthday presents he has received in his short existence (at least as Cho Hakkai). It has only been in the last couple of years that Goku and Sanzo have known the date of his birthday, after Gojyo ratted him out. Over these last couple of years Hakkai has become the proud owner of a book of classic philosophical texts (given by Sanzo with a grunt); a segmented container for cooking spices (a surprisingly thoughtful gift from Goku); a traumatised mouse from a proud Hakuryu and two presents from Gojyo. The first had been a fairly humdrum – yet strangely interesting - trick poker deck that had taken him a few days to figure out the trick. The second had arrived on his bed after everyone had gone to their respective rooms and there, wrapped in a length of brown paper and badly tied with twine had been a red leather-bound book. Gojyo had bought him a complete health care manual and - more to the point - had marked three sections with coloured bits of paper. The first had been _Self-relaxation techniques for body and soul_ , second had been _Qi-gong and the art of movement_ and the third had been _Sexual actions for stimulation of mind and body_. All the presents had been Hakkai’s small window into his friends’ souls.

12\. The number of positions he has now tried from the manual.

21\. The number of times he has now had sex with Gojyo. Not as many as he would prefer, but finding private moments together where neither is injured, both are awake, are in the same room and Gojyo is not … indisposed … is hard. He still isn’t quite sure how this arrangement with his cocky red-haired friend has become a more regular thing. It had started from an emotional and physical venting after the Kami-sama incident which had involved bandaging each other’s wounds over a bottle of a clear and quite questionable spirit which had moved into a messy tangle of lips and legs. They had stumbled into the bathroom, clawing at each others clothes, finally resulting in having him up against the wall of the bathroom, gripping the flimsy shower rail gasping in half pain, half intense pleasure, as Gojyo filled him to capacity, moaned in his ear and bit down on his shoulder. After that several angry moments of release, what has once been a heat-of-the moment has now become something of an arrangement. When one is feeling particularly frustrated. Or lonely. At times Hakkai is unsure if this ‘arrangement’ is a relationship or – just as its name dictates – merely an arrangement that involves two friends fucking. 

21 is the number of times Hakkai has thought of asking for a proper definition.

27\. These are the potential sexual partners Gojyo has possibly had since starting the journey. Hakkai keeps a jealous guard over the numbers, hoping that one day Gojyo will notice his disapproving gaze from the dinner table as he chats up another waitress. Or will notice how Hakkai waits up for him until he stumbles into bed – he always comes back to their rooms – and more often than not, gently heals his bruises, locates the ashtray and ensures that a glass of water and a few aspirin are not far away.

… Although each of those 27 times, Hakkai has never been 100% sure Gojyo has actually slept with these women. …

… As 13 of those times Gojyo has come to his bed after less than an hour.

1,895. This is how old Cho Hakkai really is in days. Cho Gonou was nineteen when he ‘died’ and Cho Hakkai was ‘born’. Hakkai finds this information both fascinating and disturbing all in one. Although he knows he is different from before and has let go of Cho Gonou’s rage, bitterness and futile life; he still experiences it. He has the memories. He can still summon the feelings from the life before – although to do this requires an iron self-control not to be sucked in by them – but they are not his. It’s like Cho Gonou is another existence inside him. Like a forgotten twin.

1\. And there is one other. Hakkai only glimpses him in dreams as a ripple of brown hair, a wisp of smoke and a flash of a long blade and when he is on the fringes of consciousness where he swears he can smell the faint floral scent of cherry blossoms. And he can feel this ‘other’ deep inside him with it’s calm, wry voice and glinting glasses. It is an older presence, much older. It isn’t Cho Gonou. That desperate scream of grief in the darkness is mostly quietened now. No, this is one existence is within him but it is not separate, but a one divided, someday to become a whole one.

Hakkai can deal with numbers. It’s the bits between he could do without.


End file.
